Scientists Misunderstanding Badly

Scientists Misunderstanding Badly

Comments 0 Comment

What do science folk like Neil deGrasse Tyson, Stephen Hawking, and Bill Nye have in common other than being science folk? They are like the apparent majority of people online who talk dismissively about feminism while not knowing very much about it. While I’m guessing Tyson, Hawking, and Nye know little about feminism, as well, I’m concerned here with their ignorance and confusion regarding philosophy. In what follows, I will focus on Tyson. While the online community’s ignorance of feminism…

Read More Read More

After the Funeral

After the Funeral

Comments 0 Comment

Tragic, hard—this life. I do not ask why. I do ask for kindness. I do ask for some level of nuance in the face of uncertainty in the face of death. — Do not give me a child’s reason for believing in your “Amen.” Tell me of how he preached love, charity, and non-violence and my fleshy soul will be moved, eager for more— just do not denigrate or write off this life, so tragic so hard.

Nihilism, Hell, and Self-Interest

Nihilism, Hell, and Self-Interest

Comments 2 comments

Often when people fear hell, they fear it in the sense of an afterlife of eternal torment, or, perhaps more sophisticatedly, eternal separation from God. As others have noted, though, hell exists on earth in a variety of forms. For example, you can read Sartre’s “No Exit” as making the case that “hell is other people.” As an introvert, I find that line of thinking attractive, but I think a more pressing form of hell on earth is putting one’s…

Read More Read More

The Wisdom of Pain

The Wisdom of Pain

Comments 0 Comment

“…if I say again that the greatest human good is daily to converse about virtue [value/meaning], and all that concerning which you hear me examining myself and others, and that the life which is unexamined is not worth living – that you are still less likely to believe.” —Socrates in Plato’s Apology Others have written on this essay’s topic, likely better than I. And since my background is largely academic, I feel a pressing urge to research what they’ve said,…

Read More Read More

“You cannot petition Kannon with Prayer!”—Calling upon Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara through Embodied Compassion

“You cannot petition Kannon with Prayer!”—Calling upon Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara through Embodied Compassion

Comments 0 Comment

In Mahayana Buddhism, enacting the life of the Bodhisattva is the goal of every practitioner. The Bodhisattva is one whose compassion for others’ suffering is so great that she delays her final escape from samsara (the cycle of birth, death, and rebirth, life to life, and which is characterized by suffering and dissatisfaction) until she has helped to awaken all other sentient beings, freeing them from suffering and samsara. There are two basic varieties of Bodhisattvas. The first are the…

Read More Read More

Not So Single-Pointed Philosophical Activity

Not So Single-Pointed Philosophical Activity

Comments 1 comment

Meditation, particularly in the tradition of Dōgen, is the paradigm for single-pointed activity. Whether you follow your breath or “just sit,” openly aware of the present moment in its entirety, Dōgen makes clear that you are not to judge whatever arises as good or bad. And when thoughts, images, desires, etc., arise, you let them go and return to the “object” of meditation. In so doing you are contributing to the re-habituation of your mind, getting “better” at letting go…

Read More Read More

Single-pointed Activity: When eating eat; when walking walk.

Single-pointed Activity: When eating eat; when walking walk.

Comments 0 Comment

Satori (enlightenment?) on the cushion in all of its ineffability is said to be single-pointed; a dissolution of the self and all selves. But such dissolution could not be the way of lived enlightenment practice off the cushion. For otherwise in your attempt to be compassionate activity in the world, you would be no better off than the perverse skeptic who refuses to avoid the pitfall because he’s convinced his senses cannot be trusted. Nevertheless, off the cushion, there is…

Read More Read More

You are Right and I have my Peace—On the Pursuit of Truth and a Meaningful Life

You are Right and I have my Peace—On the Pursuit of Truth and a Meaningful Life

Comments 0 Comment

What am I after in pursuing philosophy? A ready answer is: the Truth. The truth about whatever philosophical topic I might be interested in. But this answer is problematic for a number of important reasons. One is that philosophy is extremely difficult and I’d have to be a fool or full of hubris to think that I will figure out any significant truths, truths that greater minds than my own failed to see. Another is revealed in the following passage…

Read More Read More

Cutting Off the Finger Pointing to the Moon: A Commentary on Dōgen’s, “…when one side is illuminated, the other side is dark.”

Cutting Off the Finger Pointing to the Moon: A Commentary on Dōgen’s, “…when one side is illuminated, the other side is dark.”

Comments 1 comment

In Dōgen’s “Genjō-Kōan” fascicle of the Shōbōgenzō, he writes: When you see forms or hear sounds fully engaging body-and-mind, you intuit dharmas intimately. Unlike things and their reflections in the mirror, and unlike the moon and its reflection in the water, when one side is illuminated, the other side is dark. I would venture to say that part of the value of Dōgen’s writing, like that of many good poems and prose, is that it is open to multiple readings…

Read More Read More